I’m already thinking of a keep-fit DVD, a book and perhaps even a TV series entitled ‘LOOKING GOOD WITH PIERS MORGAN’.

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 10

Sex scandals are a non-discriminatory
genre.

They can strike anyone, anywhere, regardless of age, aesthetic
quality or position of authority.

General David Petraeus is a brilliant, fearless leader who commanded respect through his deeds and words

General David Petraeus is, in my
opinion – and more pertinently, that of my brother, a British Army
colonel – one of the finest military men of his generation. A brilliant,
fearless leader who commanded respect through his deeds and words.

I met him at a party in Washington DC
in April.

He had recently been appointed director of the CIA. We spoke
for perhaps 20 minutes about everything from CNN (‘I like your show…
most of the time’) to his admiration of British troops (‘I can’t speak
highly enough about them – our finest military allies in the world’).

He was a small, wiry, very
lean-looking man with a bone-crushing handshake and eyes that bored
straight into yours. He was also razor-sharp, very personable, and canny
about the ways of the media.

‘Would you consider doing an interview
with me?’ I asked, emboldened by the large whisky in my hand.

‘Sure,’
he smiled. ‘AFTER the election…’

Unfortunately, on November 7, just
after Barack Obama had been re-elected – thus releasing General Petraeus
to possibly grant my request – news of his affair with his biographer
Paula Broadwell was broken to the White House by intelligence officials.

And two days later, after a meeting with the President, Petraeus resigned.

America, like Britain, is peculiarly
puritanical for a country so famed for defending ‘freedom’, and the
revelation of Petraeus’s infidelity sparked the usual country-wide
cacophony of moral outrage.

It’s exactly the kind of outrage I’d
have certainly embraced in my old tabloid-editor days. But today,
perhaps enlightened by my years in the real world, I’m not so sure.

Yes,
Petraeus behaved badly, but really that’s a matter for him and his wife
to resolve, unless it emerges there were genuinely serious security
issues.

The bottom line is that America has lost one of its most brilliant military stars just when men like him are needed most.

Three of the nation’s greatest
generals – Eisenhower, MacArthur and Patton – all had affairs. As did
great presidents like Roosevelt, Kennedy and Clinton.

All were famed as bold, risk-taking high achievers.

As indeed is Mick Jagger, who launched
a new Stones documentary this week by saying, ‘This film takes you back
to a younger, perhaps gentler America, where only IBM and the military
had computers, there were no smartphones and we didn’t read other
people’s emails, so we didn’t know generals were having affairs.’

He’s got a point.

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 12

The most depressing news since Obama’s re-election is that gun sales have been soaring in America as a result.

In October alone, as polls began to
suggest he’d win again, background checks on people applying to buy guns
rose by 18.4 per cent.

Shares in weapons manufacturers like Smith & Wesson have surged too since last Tuesday’s result came in, due to massively increased demand.

The reason? Obama indicated during one of the presidential debates that he might bring in tougher gun laws relating to high-powered assault weapons.

That was enough to trigger a sprint for guns in a country where there are already 300 million in circulation, and 11-12,000 Americans get killed by them each year.

Mel Bernstein, owner of the Dragonman Arms gun shop in Colorado Springs, said it all: ‘We’re going from normally six to eight guns a day to 25. I stocked up. I got a stockpile of AK-47s; we’re selling these like hot cakes.’

It was in nearby Aurora, Colorado, that a deranged student called James Holmes dressed up like the Joker and shot 70 people in a movie theatre, killing 12.

One of his four weapons was a Smith & Wesson semi-automatic rifle.

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 13

Susan Boyle came to my CNN studio in New York today, and broke my heart.

‘Am I still your favourite?’ I asked my Britain’s Got Talent protégée, as we discussed her new album.

'What about Donny Osmond, with whom you sing a duet on this record?' I asked Susan Boyle. She pursed her lips. 'I like him too'

‘Oh yes, Piersy!’ she chuckled. ‘Definitely!’

‘What about Donny Osmond, with whom you sing a duet on this record?’

Susan pursed her lips. ‘I like him too.’

‘Time to choose, Susan,’ I said firmly. ‘You can only have one favourite – it’s me or Donny.’

She looked up, right into my eyes, and replied, ‘OK… well… in that case… it has… to be… Donny.’

Crushing.

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 14

The Newsnight scandals have been terrible for the BBC. But I don’t think the show should be cancelled, nor that the Corporation should have its licence revoked.

Both are valuable institutions in British life.

What I would like, though, is for Jeremy Paxman’s perma-sneer whenever he discusses tabloid journalism to now be surgically removed.

Doesn’t work now we know his programme’s ‘journalism’ isn’t fit to lace a tabloid reporter’s boots.